Dark matches
The Dalton Brothers b Mike Mondo & Nick Nemeth
Chuck Palumbo b Paul Burchill
Smackdown
Batista b Domino
Khali & Ranjin Singh did an interview on the screen. They showed a clip which was supposed to be Khali destroying people, but instead it was clip of Hornswoggle screwing with Jamie Noble. It appeared to be a mistake because Khali & Singh didn't sell it so it'll be corrected in post-editing
Chavo Guerrero comes out to Rey Mysterio's music and makes fun of him
Chavo Guerrero b Eugene with the frog splash
Mark Henry b Sterling James Keenan - More clips of Undertaker being beaten down and a druid came out, I guess to signify Undertaker on the way back
Victoria b Torrie Wilson. After the match, Michelle McCool attacked Victoria
Matt Hardy b Finlay via count out - Hornswoggle tried to interfere but Jamie Noble chased him away
Finlay is yelling at Noble and slaps a drink out his hand. The drink goes all over Kane. There's always somebody walking by backstage in WWE. Kane attacked Finlay
Kane b Sylvan. So much for the Sylvan/Maryse gimmick with a push
Chris Masters does a Masterlock challenge to someone out of the crowd. A guy comes out saying he was a football and wrestling star who just got out of jail. Masters sends him away and picks another guy and puts him down. The second guy was John McChesney
Khali b Flair. Post mach beatdown and Batista made the save
Dark match
Khali b Batista via DQ when Flair hit Khali with a chair
Credit: wrestlingobserver.com
I guess this is the first time that there has been a televised WWE event in the Youngstown area in twelve years. Crowd was pretty geeked and the house seemed pretty full. The Chevrolet Centre is not very big - maybe 15,000 if that. It has no upper level. Just floor seating then one level of arena around that. There weren't many empty seats. But the small building made the pyro absolutely deafening.
DARK MATCHES
(1) Jesse & Festus Dalton (the new hillbilly tag team that's been promoted the last few weeks) defeated two jobbers after the hot tag to Festus. The Daltons did a good job getting the crowd into it and were actually pretty entertaining.
(2) Chuck Palumbo defeated Paul Burchill, who was without his pirate gimmick. Crowd was not impressed with either of these two. Two big guys doing a lot of restholds with an occasional power move.
SMACKDOWN TAPING
(1) Batista defeated Deuce (or was it Domino? I couldn't tell). Batista got a HUGE pop. No one cared about the greaser guys. When will WWE figure out that no one likes wrestlers with lame gimmicks? After the match, Khali shows up on the Titantron and runs his mouth about how bad he is. Khali (rather, his translator) tells everyone to watch how bad he is. Then, a clip of Hornswoggle twice defeating Jamie Noble is shown, presumably by mistake. I am pretty sure it was supposed to be a clip of Khali beating down Flair from last week. A lot of the crowd was confused. I guess they'll fix that for TV.
Then Tony Chimel tells us to welcome back Rey Mysterio! Crowd pops huge for Rey.
Rey comes out but it is soon apparent that it's actually Chavo Guerrero doing a parody of Rey, talking about how he's afraid and can't beat Chavo. Eugene comes out for a match.
(2) Chavo Guerrero defeated Eugene after Eugene hits the 3 Amigos and then misses the Frog Splash.
(3) Mark Henry defeated some jobber, then runs his mouth about how it's getting redundant (tell me about it). They show a clip of him beating people and one of the Undertaker. After the clip there is some mysterious druid guy down by the ring who walks away to creepy Druid music I guess. Not sure what this will be on TV. However, the crowd absolutely didn't care at ALL about Mark Henry. He's even worse in person. The whole place was silent during his match, except for the occasional cry of "YOU SUCK!"
(4) Victoria (w/Kenny Dykstra) defeated Torrie Wilson (w/Jimmy Wang Yang). After the match, Michelle McCool makes the save.
(5) Matt Hardy defeated Finlay in a really long match. Crowd was really behind Hardy. Hornswoggle tried to interfere at one point, but Jamie Noble came out and chased him to the back. Matt Hardy rolls up the distracted Finlay for the win.
Backstage, Finlay accosts Jamie Noble for screwing with Hornswoggle. He slaps a drink from Noble's hand and it splashes on Kane by mistake. Kane then beats on Finlay.
(6) Kane defeated Sylvan Grenier. Sylvan came out first and no one cared at all, and a lot of people around me didn't know who he was. This was a quick match. After the match, Finlay attacks Kane with his shillelagh and leaves him lying.
Then we have the Masterlock challenge. Masters picks a guy from the audience because he says everyone in the locker room is too scared. The guy he picks first from the audience is a big guy, and he tells Masters that he was All-State in football and captain of the wrestling team, and also just got out of jail on a manslaughter conviction. Masters acts scared and tells him to beat it. Masters picks another guy and quickly puts him down in the Masterlock.
(7) The Great Khali defeated Ric Flair in the main event. Youngstown is definitely Flair Country. There was a "USA" chant during the match. Flair made a show of it, but the end was predictable. Khali continued the beat down after the match, and Batista came out to make the save. Khali put the claw on him and laid him out, too.
That was the end of the taping. After ECW was over, Khali defeated Batista by DQ when Flair came out and hit Khali with a chair. Crowd goes home happy.
credit: pwtorch.com
